Forced labour in Brazil: the fight goes on

28 August 2008 - Natanael Laurentino, a 29 year old rural worker from Maranhão state, northern Brazil, was unemployed when he heard a radio advert offering jobs in neighbouring Piaui. He applied and was hired for the job. On a bus with other workers, he traveled for three days to reach an estate 100 kilometres from the nearest town. Trouble started immediately.

Upon arrival, the employers collected everyone's employment cards and stamped "cancelled" on them. Natanael was put to clear fields with a chainsaw wearing no protection gear. "When I asked about my pay, I was always told 'later'," says Nataneal. After two months and no pay, he stopped working. The man who hired him took him to a city and left him with no money. Natanael was one of the lucky ones.

It is estimated that between 25,000 and 40,000 poor workers are still victims of forced labour in Brazil. The northern agricultural states like Piauí, Maranhão, Pará and Mato Grosso are the most problematic as vast distances make it difficult to detect violations.

Brazil has taken the problem very seriously, including through the set up of a Special Group for Mobile Inspection (Grupo Especial de Fiscalização Móvel) composed of labour inspectors, federal policemen and labour law prosecutors. Over the past 14 years, the inspection teams have rescued around 30,000 workers from forced labour conditions.

In 2002, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the Brazilian Government joined forces to combat forced labour in the country. The initiative supports national efforts, including the inspection teams, and awareness-raising and prevention activities. It also addresses how to assist workers once they are freed.

In this regard, a successful initiative has been the Citizen's Charcoal Institute (Instituto Carvão Cidadão - ICC), created by 14 companies to monitor producers of charcoal and to eliminate forced labour in the steel industry.

The ICC, with support from ILO and the German technical cooperation agency, has been implementing a programme to rehabilitate rescued workers. It offers them skills-training and finds them employment. Last year, Natanael along with 104 other rescued workers joined the ICC and were offered jobs with steel makers in the states of Pará and Maranhão.

The goal is not only to eliminate forced labour in the sectors where it happens, but across all the supply chains as well. To this end, the Brazilian authorities, with assistance from ILO, have launched a National Pact to Combat Forced Labour. Almost 200 hundred private and public companies have adhered to it since 2005.

The Pact obliges companies to remove from their supply chains any inputs produced through forced labour. A significant share of Brazil's GDP is committed to this fight now that large companies such as Petrobrás, Vale do Rio Doce, and Pão de Açúcar have signed on to the cause. Every six months, the Labour Ministry also publishes a so-called "dirty list" with the names of companies and employers that have resorted to forced labour.

"The challenge now is to implement a monitoring system of the National Pact. This will bring more transparency and better articulate employer's action against forced labour," says Andrea Bolzon, Manager of ILO's project to combat forced labour.

Contributed by ILO - Original article